


Star Trek and Science and Falling in Love

by Avengerz



Category: Black Panther (2018), Black Panther (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Fem!T'Challa, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Pen Pals, Pre-Slash, SCIENCE!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-21 22:58:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7408570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Avengerz/pseuds/Avengerz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It takes nearly a year for Tony to even realize that T’Challa is a girl. And yes, he realizes how horrifyingly sexist that is, that he reads a scientific article she co-published in 2003, saw “Dr. T’Challa” and assumed it was a guy, he gets it, he’s sorry, but in his defense it takes him another decade and a half before he figures out she’s the princess of Wakanda.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Star Trek and Science and Falling in Love

**Author's Note:**

> For a prompt on [ImagineIronPanther](http://imagineironpanther.tumblr.com): "I had a sudden urge for female T'challa and she's a bamf and maybe does something really awesome and catches Tony's eye and I'm not really sure I just know I've seen Tony be a girl but so far not T'challa and I'd like to see that."
> 
> Women in STEM are super bamf, so I went with that.

It takes nearly a year for Tony to even realize that T’Challa is a girl. And yes, he realizes how horrifyingly sexist that is, that he reads a scientific article she co-published in 2003, saw “Dr. T’Challa” and assumed it was a guy, he gets it, he’s sorry, but in his defense it takes him another decade and a half before he figures out she’s the princess of Wakanda.

He never really follows her work very closely, that’s his excuse. Tony prides himself on keeping as updated and educated in the science community as possible, but as a weapons developer his focus is pretty limited to things that go boom. Then in 2004 she publishes an article on the theoretical physics of teleportation, expanding on the 1997 success in teleporting the spin of a photon. Her article has nothing to do with weapons, and Tony can’t really find a way to apply her theoretical physics to artillery shells, but he’s a huge Star Trek nerd and the article is fascinating. He looks into her a little further, reads a few more of the rare articles to leave  Wakanda’s borders, discovers she’s female, finds her contact information.

Tony shoots her an email because she’s brilliant and she snuck in a subtle joke about Scotty in her article. It’s relatively short, a quick thing to let her know that the great Tony Stark thinks she’s pretty swell and all that. He’s not really expecting a reply, but he gets one, full of dry wit and subtle digs at his manhood. Later, Tony will think that’s the moment he starts to fall in love.

They don’t chat very frequently. She’ll send him articles on green energy and Tony will send her links to Star Trek trivia quizzes and she’ll get surprisingly awful scores and he’ll offer to send her all of the TV show(s) and movies and she’ll be weirdly amused by the offer. Tony will write a robotics piece for Popular Science and mention that vibranium would be far preferable to a gold-titanium alloy and she’ll link him to a passive-aggressive report about the effects of civilized war on third-world countries. He’ll pry into  Wakanda’s business and she’ll retort with dry quips about his promiscuity and Tony loves it, their strange frenemy status.

Besides the occasional sarcastic email from both end, things continue as normal. Tony still gets drunk and sleeps around and doesn’t pay enough attention to where his weapons are ending up. He still ends up at the wrong end of a spray of shrapnel and a father-figure’s betrayal. He still becomes Iron Man.

T’Challa emails him, once, after he gets back home.

_ “I’m pleased to be proven right once more; you’re too stubborn to die.” _

Tony laughs.

 

* * *

 

After Monaco, he gets too drunk for his broken heart to handle and orders JARVIS to email her because there’s no other humans left in his life to care.  _ “I’m dying,” _ he tells her, “ _ from the very thing that’s supposed to keep me alive. I knew karma was a bitch but this is getting kind of ridiculous.” _

She doesn’t reply, but two days after he figures it out for himself, a blueprint for the vibranium atom arrives in the mail.

 

* * *

 

_ “You’re an idiot, _ ” she emails him sometime during the Mandarin debacle. Tony grins when JARVIS shows it to him, safe in Stark Tower once more.

 

_ “I know.”  _ He tells her.

 

* * *

 

_ “I fucked up.”  _ Tony has to write this email out by hand, because the fucking murder-bot he accidentally created  _ killed  _ JARVIS.  _ “I fucked up big time.” _

 

Her reply is quick, this time.  _ “You do that quite frequently, it seems.”  _ Tony tries not to let that hurt.  _ “But you always make things right again. You can fix this, Tony.” _

 

He can’t, really, but Vision is a good first step, and leaving the Avengers is best for everyone.

 

* * *

 

Tony meets with King T’Chaka before the summit begins, because he supports the Accords, they’re necessary and he’s intimately aware of that, but he’d still like to get a feel of the guy that’s spearheading them. The success of these regulations will depend on which type of slimy politician this king is, he thinks.

 

But T’Chaka seems to be a great guy. His smile is wide and bright, his passion for peace is genuine, and he chats with Tony, addressing all of his concerns, for a good half hour. Then a woman steps up to them, gorgeous, but not one of the terrifying bodyguards that Tony knows better than to try to flirt with, and clears her throat.

 

T’Chaka beams at her before turning back to Tony. “Mr. Stark, I don’t believe you’ve met my eldest daughter, T’Challa? I believe you two will likely get along well; you’re both rather scientifically minded, and I know T’Challa’s always been interested in your work.”

 

Tony’s barely processing what the king is saying, too busy staring at  _ the princess of Wakanda _ in shocked amazement. She smiles at him, something impertinent and teasing underneath the regality. “Actually, we are already acquainted, father.”

 

“Uh, yeah,” Tony says slowly. “You left out the minor detail that you were the  _ princess _ of Wakanda in our correspondences, though.”

 

T’Challa shrugs, her smile widening. “I didn’t think it was pertinent.”

 

“Huh.” Tony scoffed. “Alright, well, now that we’re finally meeting in person, I’ve just got to say.” He pauses for dramatic effect and T’Challa raises an eyebrow. “There’s absolutely no way in hell that Next Generation is better than the Original Series.”

 

T’Chaka looks between them in confusion as T’Challa bursts into laughter and Tony grins widely.

 

**Author's Note:**

> In case anyone is wondering, yes, T'Challa is still the Black Panther in this 'verse.
> 
> You can find more IronPanther at [ImagineIronPanther](http://imagineironpanther.tumblr.com) or me at my [tumblr!](http://anthonyfuckingstark.tumblr.com)
> 
> As always, comments are loved and read over and over again.


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